I’ve never had bad experiences with doctors. 50+ years and was I lucky? Not sure. But what happened to me should be criminal. The people involved should be in jail. We are all told to see a doctor immediately. Well, I didn’t, but a few days later my sores had gotten bigger and red edged. I was more concerned with the kittens I had just rescued and getting these things off of them. I watched them part the kitten’s hair and then enter the skin, making a lump. Two thick antennae protruded from the skin. If I slicked the cat’s hair down, these stood up. You couldn’t pull them out, either. I’m writing this with full knowledge of my records being available and knowing my rights, as well as finding out what is worst of all - those closest to me were instrumental in this process.
Yes, people think they are getting someone actual help for what they don’t understand, but that’s not the case.
My boyfriend was fighting with me and my granddaughter held up something between us so it would stop. He was yelling that I was killing the cat by putting Vaseline on it. He yelled at her for what she did and I came unglued. No one ever disciplines my kids or grandkids. I’m not sure what all I threatened but I’m sure it wasn’t nice. He called me crazy and some other things. It wasn’t good. The next thing I knew my neighbor was here and telling me my sores were septic and she was taking me to the ER. I agreed and packed just in case. It was Sunday night.
On the way I texted my Lyme doctor. She said be sure the hospital will prescribe ivermectin if it’s parasitic. I called ahead and went to the one who did. I had been there many times, most recently for a hysterectomy. My paperwork would be the same. I checked in and eventually went in a room.
Why are you here?
I have these sores that my Lyme doctor said are infected. She told me to come here. I was seeing a PA, Katelynn Bresee at Baptist Hospital. She looked from afar, didn’t touch me. I told her my other symptoms - left ankle and hand swelling, dizziness, eyes burning, and these mystery sores. She said she would run tests. Blood and urine were done. My urine was brown and something was swimming in it. She came in and looked at my back but I didn’t know why. The sores were on my left leg and forearm. My back is tattooed so she couldn’t see anything anyway. She commented that there were none there to my neighbor. Not me - my neighbor.
Now at this point she should have asked ME how they started, what I thought they were, if I had made them myself, etc. Instead she called my angry boyfriend and the neighbor. I have three children, a mother, and my Lyme doctor they should have talked to. Then confront me with the info. Instead, she said we are going to start an iv and admit you for crème on your sores. I said it’s that bad? Yes.
So a male nurse started an iv. Flushed it twice. I was transferred to a room where I fell asleep. Apparently I never was handed off to another staff member. I just slept there with an empty iv.
In the records, a doctor who I recently reported to the medical board, picked up my file and commented that if I refuse a urinalysis, call Fannin for a bed. Now, to break that down, I had done a urinalysis. It was charted. What he was assuming is I was on drugs and refusing. What they’re known to do is count that as a positive test and send you for drug treatment IF you’re displaying crazy behavior. I was asleep! Several hours in the chart go by, another doc picks up my file, doesn’t read it all, charts “need eta for EMS transfer.”
Three men who never said anything to me came in my room and put me on the gurney, took my stuff, ripped my iv out, strapped me down. I was screaming and crying they had the wrong person, somebody help me, on and on. They threw me in an ambulance and shut the door. I didn’t know where I was taken. They put me in a cement room and left. I kept screaming. Four women came in and stripped me, held me down, took photos, put a gown on me, then tried to force me into a tiny room. I kept fighting and was stabbed from behind in the shoulder with haldol. I fought harder. Shot again with double dose. Lights out.
Two and a half days later I woke up to a woman screaming at me. I was in the room furthest from them for all that time unconscious, not getting fluids, nothing. The rest of the story is just sickening. The next morning the doctor asked me why I was there. I said where? I didn’t know. He asked if I made sores on myself. I said no. I never said I did. So he let me go home the next day. Four days being treated like an animal without a hearing. My kids couldn’t find me. They did nothing for me. The sheets were stuck to my sores. I stopped on the way home at a clinic to get antibiotics.
My labs were horrible. I was almost in kidney failure. Of course no attorney would take my case. Everyone I reported it to referred me elsewhere. When I called for my records, I didn’t get them all. The second set had been changed. They signed my name on a form when I was unconscious. But the PA added to why I was there that I said “I literally pulled a 3” worm out of my skin, I kid you not.”
I can promise if I had pulled a 3 inch worm out of my body I would’ve been there within the hour with the worm in my hand. Not days later. And that’s not even how I talk anyway. But they get away with doing things like this because there was no recourse that I could take in any way shape or form. I tried everything for two years solid and still got nowhere with anyone. I even asked the hospital to let me sit down with these doctors and ask them why and they said no.
PTSD is real. I still don’t sleep.